Foxheart
by Rikkamaru
Summary: Hiro will do anything to have Tadashi live again. Even make a deal with a devil. Gen. One-shot, no pairings.


Don't own Big Hero 6.

Don't own the Cover Art.

Foxheart

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><p>Hiro lasted three weeks after Callaghan's arrest before he broke down again. Callaghan was gone and that's good and all, and the team help keep the nightmares at bay. But the nightmares still come, and the hole in his heart won't leave, even with Baymax returned and by his side as often as he can be.<p>

He missed Tadashi. He sees him everywhere; in the kitchen during dinner, in the lab whenever he goes into Tadashi's old office. Tadashi is wherever he is, and it breaks something in Hiro's chest.

And so he began to research. There had to be a way to bring someone back to life, right? There are teleportation devices and personal flying machines. Surely there was a way to at least see Tadashi one more time. So he dove deeper and deeper into internet sites and ancient books that poured out dust when he opened them. Eventually, after another week of constant digging with few days of classes, he struck gold.

"_The Japanese kitsune have an embodiment of its power and soul called the hoshi no tama, and if captured the kitsune is bound to obey the person who captured them and will grant any wish asked of them."_

Hiro stared at the paragraph, a grin slowly appearing on his face. He then began specifically researching kitsune. It looked like he needed to go fox hunting.

Another week passed and Hiro was ready, pieces of fried tofu placed in a plastic bag in his backpack alongside Megabot who he has on hand in case things go south. He took a deep breath and set out, determined to get his brother back.

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><p>A sharp giggle echoed eerily around him after an hour of Hiro wandering through the woods. "Silly little ningen," the androgynous voice taunted from somewhere above him, and the teen shifted his bag, nervous but stubborn. "Didn't your parents tell you that it's dangerous to wander around the woods at night? And with food on you as well." It sounded closer. "An appetizer before the main course perhaps?"<p>

Hiro gulped but steeled his nerves. "I haven't had parents since I was 6," he started sharply, before continuing, "and no one knows the old myths anymore." He began taking off his backpack to reach for the zip lock bag. "So I thought you might like some fried tofu."

"How…thoughtful." The fox sounded as if it didn't believe a word Hiro had said, but clearly wanted the tofu enough to stick around. Hiro's hands shook slightly as he opened the bag and tossed it to the fox, but the spirit didn't notice as it pounced on the food offered to it. As the kitsune was eating, Hiro looked around it cautiously. His eyes lit up when they landed on an orb glowing just above the kitsune's head, moving up and down to some unknown force.

The kitsune's hoshi no tama.

Hiro struck when the fox looked down for a moment to find more tofu, and pounced on the orb, caging it in his hands.

The kitsune knew what happened immediately as it reared back with a snarl. "Filthy, lying human," it seethed, its tail thrashing in anger. "Tricking this one, like all filthy ningen! Give this one back its hoshi no tama!"

"I won't give you back your jewel until you grant my wish," Hiro told it, holding tight to the orb as it pulsed in response to the fox's anger.

The kitsune snarled again but sat down. "Say it then, little human, and be grateful that I cannot attack you unless you return to these woods another day."

Hiro took a deep breath. "I want you to bring my brother back to life." The orb pulsed brightly as it prepared to grant his wish.

And then it disappeared, returning to the fox's side.

Hiro and the kitsune stared at the human's hands, Hiro with a growing sense of horror and dread before a cruel smile crossed the fox's face. "Poor, pathetic ningen," it cooed, standing to stalk around the motionless boy. "Ready to cross heaven and earth for his nii-chan, to see his smile and feel his arms around you, only for your grand plan to come to naught. Stupid little human, whose precious nii-chan doesn't even _exist_," it hissed the last word out with relish, waking Hiro from his funk.

"Shut up!" He shouted at it, backing up nervously. "Tadashi is real!"

"A brother as perfect as that?" It laughed at him, and Hiro realized with a spike of fear that it'd read his mind. "A brother that smart, and strong, and kind?" It laughed again. "Your delusion is quite amusing, you filthy little ningen."

The kitsune continued to torment the boy, and Hiro could do nothing but curl up for protection. Its words and his ringing denial made him forget completely about his battle bot lying ready in his bag. The torment finally ended however when a voice rose up from the darkness around the human. "That's quite enough, Wave Walker. You've had your revenge for him grabbing your hoshi no tama."

The blue-grey fox that had been mocking Hiro flinched and backed away. With its submission another kitsune appeared from the shadows, grey and black with two tails trailing behind it, one of the tails curled around its own hoshi no tama. "As you say, Flame Caller. I will take my leave." The fox scampered out of view, leaving Hiro with the two-tailed spirit.

When the fox showed no sign of leaving him to his thoughts, Hiro looked up at it cautiously. "…Thank you."

"I will escort you back to the edge of the forest," was all it said, voice strained and sounding annoyed. It began to walk off and Hiro scrambled to catch up to it. They were silent for a while with the exception of the cracking of branches and leaves, before Flame Caller sighed and spoke up. "So what were you thinking? Rushing here, probably _without_ telling anyone what you were planning, and no backup plans whatsoever?"

Hiro huffed. "I was trying to get my brother back."

Flame Caller was unsympathetic. "You were _trying_ to be an idiot. And you succeeded."

Hiro hissed at the fox a little in startled fury. "You don't anything about what I went through! What my brother went through!"

The kitsune spun around and snarled. "I know _everything_ about what your brother went through! That doesn't mean you get to rush into dangerous situations like a complete and utter _bonehead_!" The fox's jaws snapped shut, but he'd already said too much.

Hiro stared at the kitsune, feeling as if the ground was falling out from beneath him. "…Nii-chan?" he asked softly, and the fox's ears drooped.

"Hey Hiro," it said softly, and Hiro could do little more than stare at the kitsune that was apparently his big brother in shock.

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><p><em>Flame Caller sighed in boredom, dragging his tail through the lake he was resting in front of. The other kitsune gamboled about around him, yipping and barking in joy as they fought and played with one another.<em>

_Before Flame Caller could do little more than stand in preparation to perhaps join in their play, his ears perked as they caught the sound of bipedal feet entering the forest. He sniffed a few times to confirm it, and grinned; a human had stepped into the forest._

_The kitsune wasted no time in running to the ningen, curious to see who the first human to step into the forest in weeks even was. He cocked his head in surprise; it was a child, seven or eight if he understood human aging correctly. It – he, Flame Caller corrected; it was a male – seemed nervous but determined, and the fox's nose twitched as he came across the scent of fried tofu. So the human at least _knew_ about the kitsune._

_Flame Caller exited the cover of darkness, chuckling a little as the boy jumped in surprise. "What are you doing out here so late, human child?" he asked, tail swishing behind him. "The forest is not very safe at any time, but especially so at night."_

_The child shuffled its feet before offering a bag filled with the fried tofu Flame Caller had smelled earlier. "I…I didn't think anyone came here to feed the kitsune very much anymore, and I wanted to make sure you were eating."_

"_I…see." Flame Caller didn't entirely believe him, but he was willing to play along to see where this would go. He pawed the bag closer to himself and began eating the tofu, growing distracted after a while. That proved to be his mistake and Flame Caller yelped as his hoshi no tama was forced away from him. He looked up to see his soul resting in the child's hands._

_That seven year old had just tricked him._

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><p>Hiro stared at Flame Caller-Tadashi and shook his head to try and clear out some of the cobwebs that had formed in his head. "You're…you're alive." The teen cursed himself as his eyes burned with unshed tears but Tadashi's eyes softened and he smiled.<p>

Hiro's eyes widened a little as the fox's form blurred, before his tears really began running down his face. Tadashi stood before him in human form, looking just like he had before he had run into that burning building months ago. His brother smiled at him and ruffled his hair. "I'm alive," he confimed.

And Hiro ran into his arms, sobbing.

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><p>"<em>Alright, alright, you got me," Flame Caller laughed, sitting in front of the child who stared at him with wide, confused eyes.<em>

"_You're…not mad?" The child sounded confused but Flame Caller just shook his head._

"_Nope. You got me, fair and square. So what did you want to wish for?"_

_The child scrunched up his eyebrows again, before simply accepting what the fox was telling him and sitting across from it. He took a deep breath. "I want a big brother."_

_The kitsune's ears twitched in surprise at such an unusual request. "Lonely little genius, huh?" he asked sympathetically and the child flinched before nodding._

"_Yeah." He twisted his shirt in his hands, the hoshi no tama tangled up in his shirt with the action. "My parents died a few years ago and Aunt Cass is great, but she's too busy trying to run the café by herself to play with me." The light in the child's eyes grew brighter as he smiled. "But if I had a big brother, he could play with me and help Aunt Cass and a lot of other things! And that's why I want one." _

_The kitsune stared at the human boy for a moment longer before nodding. "Alright, I can grant your wish, but it'll cost you a bit."_

_The boy looked scared. "What'll it cost me?"_

_Flame Caller didn't bother beating around the bush with his answer. "I'm going to need some of your memories."_

_The child jumped, surprised. "What? Why?"_

"_Well you can't keep your current memories," the kitsune reasoned. "If you remember not having a big brother then that is counter-productive to the wish, so I'll need to modify them. And I'll need to see how you and Aunt Cass live, or I won't make a very good brother, now will I?"_

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><p>"So I came here once when I was a kid?" Hiro asked his brother curiously as they made their way out of the forest. His hand was wrapped tightly around his brother's in a desperate bid to prevent him from being taken away again, though Tadashi didn't say anything about it. "And I wished for a big brother?"<p>

"Yep," Tadashi confirmed, his ears still foxlike and perked, keeping a lookout for sounds of someone approaching them as he stretched his other arm out in an exercise to regain familiarity with his limbs after a few months of being in his fox form. "You came here to wish for a big brother, and were fortunate enough to have me be the first kitsune you found. The others are not as accepting about having a human child trick them as I am." He shook his head at the thought of the other kitsune he knew, and Hiro's head began to droop.

"Does…does this mean that you won't come back with me? I mean, you granted my wish technically, and I can't wish you back from the dead since you aren't really dead…" Hiro's hand began to slip away from Tadashi's but fox in human form just tightened his grip.

"Hiro," Tadashi stopped the boy and knelt in front of him, pulling him into a hug that the boy eagerly reciprocated. "I would love to come back with you. I just couldn't leave until now because kitsune aren't allowed to leave this forest whenever they want. There's a barrier around the perimeter that we can't break which keeps us here unless we're fulfilling a wish."

"I want you back," Hiro told him miserably. "I miss you, nii-chan. The others try to help, but it won't ever be enough. They aren't you." His face twisted. "But I can't destroy the barrier. Who knows what the other kitsune here would do without that barrier keeping them trapped here." Hiro looked down, hiding some of the tears that had formed at the intense hopelessness gnawing at him. "I just want you to come home."

A silence stretched between the two as Hiro stared at the ground and Tadashi stared at his younger brother. The kitsune broke the silence as he ruffled his brother's hair and smiled. "I'm glad to hear you say that, otouto. And I think I know how I can grant your wish." Before Hiro's expectant eyes one of Tadashi's tails was presented to him, his brother's hoshi no tama offered to him.

The boy stared for a moment, too stunned to speak. "Nii-chan…are you sure?"

"I'm sure," the kitsune assured, his eyes soft. "You've had my heart for seven years now." He smiled. "What's another 90?"

Hiro gave him a tremulous smile before accepting the glowing orb and throwing his arms around his brother again. They left the forest side by side, Tadashi using his powers to remove his death from everyone's memories – bar his brother, of course – and instead making it where he was injured in the fire and stuck in the hospital for a while.

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><p>"<em>Wait. <em>You'll_ be my brother?" Hiro couldn't believe his ears as the kitsune sat serenely in front of him, shocking him without even trying if its amused look was anything to go by. The seven year old had expected a number of things to happen tonight when he had gone into the woods; what was really happening hadn't even crossed his mind._

"_Of course," the fox wrinkled its nose. "When I grant a wish, I grant a wish. It was either I become your brother or I enchanted some inanimate object to be your brother, and the latter is almost always found out in the first year. Plus, I haven't really seen the human world in a while; I'm curious to see how it has changed."_

"…_Okay." It was weird to see a fox so bent on doing the best it could to grant his wish, but Hiro wasn't going to complain. "So what will happen?"_

"_I'll read your mind to get an idea of what kind of brother you want," the kitsune explained. "After I create my human persona, I'll insert it into your memories and into the world, making sure he exists legally in the real world and comfortably in your life. I'll also have to remove this encounter out of your mind, or else that could mess things up. Since I only have one tail, it'll take a lot out of me," it admitted sheepishly. "I'll completely forget that I was a kitsune, fully becoming your brother until certain circumstances are met."_

"_What circumstances?" Hiro asked, curious despite himself._

"_If I'm willingly surrounded by my elemental affinity, I'll regain my memories and powers and be sent back to this forest," the kitsune admitted regretfully, its ears drooping before perking back up again. "On the bright side, my affinity is fire, and humans rarely find themselves willingly being surrounded by fire."_

_Hiro nodded in relief to that statement and the kitsune stepped closer. "Now let's make you a brother." The fox reached for Hiro's forehead but paused. "I almost forgot. My name is Flame Caller, which isn't a very human name to go by. So," here its eyes locked on to his, amber orbs bright with the magic lying just behind them, "what do you want to name your big brother?"_

_Hiro wanted to giggle at the absurdity of the question, but instead thought hard on it before staring back at the fox. "Tadashi."_

"_Tadashi Hamada it is then," the kitsune agreed, before it touched its nose to Hiro's forehead and a pillar of light engulfed them, changing both of their lives forever._

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><p>I've been tempted to write this for a few days now, so woohoo! I was also tempted to write the opposite version, with Kitsune!Hiro instead. Maybe some other day. Hope you guys liked it.<p>

Please review.

Ja ne!


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